Monday, April 27, 2009

This is not the greatest creek in the world... This is just a blog post.

I feel I can rhapsodize about this creek without contributing to "blowing it up." California has fewer than 100 class V boaters as near as I can tell. The South East is about 3000 miles away. These two factors should keep user impact pretty low, so I will go ahead and let loose on what a few have known for some time.

Darin hits "send."Darin had texted with the phrase "flows perfect, get your asses up here!" He could fall back on a career as a motivational speaker with this brand of self-actualization. Confirmed flow and open roads on the South Branch of the Middle Fork of the Feather made a potent argument.

These waterfalls get back-to-back like some commercial-free classic rock hits. Thomas requests "Freebird."

The funniest thing all day was spoken by Seth who meant it when he said, "Now that we've made it to the back-to-back waterfall section, I feel like I can relax a little."

I had run this creek before at low flows, but once we realized that Darin's "perfect" was considerably higher, the bumpy lead-in turned into an awesome ride. It was pretty much nodding and bombing through this stretch until we got to the photo-op one-stroke drops and could "relax a little."

Seth relaxes a little.

Thomas goes while Seth sets safety and sense of scale.

The cool weather made the hike out from the edge of the world alright and the freshly burned forest was free of tangly undergrowth. I was stoked to escape to this place and to actually run waterfalls like I usually just daydream.

For better pictures and actual beta go to jscreekin.blogspot.com and find the South Branch Middle Feather page.